1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to mining, and more particularly, to sorting and separating components of soil.
2. Description of the Related Art
Several designs for gold and mineral isolation devices have been designed in the past. None of them, however, includes the ability to efficiently sort soils without the need of water and can be done in a man portable machine while using, in some versions, a minimal amount of electrical or kinetic energy.
Historically, miners and prospectors could pan in a stream or in other soils in an attempt to find and collect gold and other earth borne materials. Panning is largely a manual endeavor using large, shallow pans that are submerged with soil and shaken to sort out the heavier gold grains from other less dense earthen materials.
More efficient means of isolating the gold, such as sluicing, have been used on small to medium scale. Although these techniques can be done by an individual, they still require copious amounts of water. The sluice process employs directing water and soil to flow through a man-made channel that captures the heavier gold and allows the alluvium or other non-gold bearing soil to wash away.
Sluicing can be highly damaging to the environment including the natural topography that is destroyed as well as contaminating the water and soils with runoff and surplus from the procedure. Historically, significant damage was caused in many fragile environments that have yet to recover.
More commercialized and modern techniques include underground mines and underwater dredging. These too produce risk to the environment on a grand scale as well as dangers to the human workers on those projects. Further, these methods are generally beyond the scope of resources and ability of an individual prospector or micro-mining operator for fun and profit.
Other patents, publications and historical records describe these and other methods of mining in detail. All of this related subject matter provide for a number of more or less complicated and costly aspects and features that fail to solve the problem in an efficient, environmentally conscious and economical way. None of these teachings suggest the novel features of the present invention.